


Crash

by scxlias



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Alcohol, M/M, Nightmares, Panic Attacks
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-07
Updated: 2015-11-07
Packaged: 2018-04-30 10:37:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,965
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5160668
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/scxlias/pseuds/scxlias
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Mason gets a text from Brett Talbot of all people at 1:26 on Saturday morning.</p><p>He jolts awake and scrambles for his phone when he hears it, praying to every god there is that its not Scott texting to tell him Liam’s hurt or something equally as bad.</p><p>He breathes a sigh of relief when its not.</p><p>[from: Brett]</p><p>I know I’m probably waking you up, but can I come crash at your place? Can’t go home.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Crash

**Author's Note:**

> As said in the tags, this fic deals with Brett getting drunk and then having a nightmare that results in a panic attack. Also talking about his dead family. Please be careful when reading. 
> 
> Hit me up at ghosthayden if you want to cry about fictional characters.

Mason gets a text from Brett Talbot of all people at 1:26 on Saturday morning.

He jolts awake and scrambles for his phone when he hears it, praying to every god there is that its not Scott texting to tell him Liam’s hurt or something equally as bad.

He breathes a sigh of relief when its not.

**[from: Brett]**

_I know I’m probably waking you up, but can I come crash at your place? Can’t go home._

**[to: Brett]**

_Yeah, I guess? Everything okay, man?_

**[from: Brett]**

_Just leave the window open. Thanks._

Mason sighs again, thanks whatever higher power is out there for the fact that his parents are out of town for the weekend, and moves to unlock the window.

Brett crawls through it half an hour later and promptly stumbles into Mason’s dresser.

“You know,” Mason says, standing from where he’d been falling asleep on his bed. “I might be new to this, but aren’t werewolves supposed to be super coordinated and all that jazz?”

Brett turns and scowls, a low growl rumbling from deep in his chest. Mason stumbles backwards. “M'still a little drunk.” Brett slurs out, looking at Mason with glowing gold eyes.

“I’m also pretty sure,” Mason adds, helping Brett to his bed to sit down, “that werewolves can’t just get drunk. Liam tried once. Didn’t work out.”

“Well I’m not a fucking quitter.” Brett mumbles, propping his elbows on his knees and putting his face in his hands. “Spiking shit with wolfsbane helps too.”

Mason balks at that. “Dude, isn’t that poison for you guys?”

Brett gives a short jerk of his head by way of answering and its silent for a moment before he groans and mutters, “And that would be why I feel like shit now that I’m starting to sober up.”

Mason’s face scrunches up in sympathy. “Sorry man, sounds like it sucks. But you kinda brought it on yourself. What are you doing putting so much effort into getting wasted on your own anyway?”

“Well a ridiculously large number of shitty things have happened today and to top it all off, its the anniversary of the day my pack was fucking murdered, so, there’s that.” Brett grumbles and Mason’s heart sinks. “That’s why I asked to come here,” He tips his head to the side and removes one hand for a moment to look up at Mason. “Didn’t want to freak my sister out on top of all of that. She doesn’t like when I drink and she’d be able to smell the alcohol. She doesn’t need to worry about me on top of everything.”

Mason shook his head and took a seat next to Brett, twisting his hands in his lap. Brett doesn’t look up, but reaches out a hand and grabs both of Mason’s to stop his fidgeting. “This is weird.” Brett says quietly are a few minutes of Mason feeling like his heart might beat out of his chest.

Mason doesn’t like the way that sounds. “Uh… What do you–”

Brett cuts him off, his voice impossibly soft. “This. This whole thing. Last year, I did the same thing. I got some serious alcohol, spiked it and drank until I was numb. When I went home a little while later, there were some of the pack there with Satomi and she said something about me being drunk and I lost it. I started screaming at her, calling her out in front of her pack… Dropped to my knees so fast I broke both my knee caps once I realized what I’d done, but still….”

“Its not a good idea to yell at your alpha, huh?”

Brett bit out a laugh. “Its probably borderline suicidal. But that’s it. That’s what I’m saying. I’m an angry drunk. Really fucking angry. Its why I only get drunk alone. But you… I’m not angry around you. Its weird.” Brett says, more to himself than to Mason.

Mason doesn’t comment, doesn’t know what to say to that. 

Brett quiets then and Mason thinks he can hear his breath hitch, so he leans a little closer and gently rests a hand on Brett’s shoulder. “Hey are you okay, Brett?”

Instead of answering, Brett says, “Did your alpha ever tell you that saying we have about losing pack?”

“My alpha? You mean Scott?” Mason furrows his brows in confusion. “Oh, dude, I’m not actually like… I’m not a part of the inner circle. I’m just Liam’s plus one.”

“Well we have a saying, among wolves. Losing pack isn’t like losing family. It’s like losing a limb. And that’s true, it feels like you’re losing a part of you and it fucking sucks. But when your pack is also your family? Its like being drawn and quartered. I felt like I was being torn apart, I feel like I’m falling apart but I can’t because I’ve gotta take care of Laurie…” Brett trails off and leans back, laying out on the bed. “Why the fuck am I telling you all of this?” he groans and throws an arm over his eyes and just lays there for a moment and Mason doesn’t know what to say. 

He sits for a minute and just stares, his mouth opening and closing because he doesn’t know what to say. His heart feels like its twisting in his chest because holy shit what Brett’s feeling must be awful and Mason just wants to fix it, wants to help him in some way, but he feels just as helpless now as he did when he couldn’t help Liam with his anger.

“I can just take a blanket and crash on the couch. I don’t want to bother you anymore, and I know there’s no one else home. Thanks for letting me stay here.” Brett says, giving Mason a small smile, plucking the quilt from the end of Mason’s bed and walking out of the room.

Mason wants to follow him down to the living room and find out if he can do something, anything to help Brett feel even a little better, but he decides against it and crawls back into bed, curls up and tries to get back to sleep. 

He jolts awake to the sound of a crash and screaming not long later. 

Mason doesn’t bother to see what time it is, or bother worrying abut what exactly could’ve caused the crash and the screaming. He just takes off down the stairs for the living room. 

What he wasn’t expecting was to find Brett thrashing in his sleep, the lamp that was on the end table now on the ground and the pieces of its light bulb scattered on the floor. Mason moves carefully around the broken glass and kneels in front of the couch, slowly becoming more panicked. 

“Brett! Brett! Wake up, you’re dreaming! Come on, wake up!” 

He reaches out a hand to try to shake Brett awake and nearly jumps out of his own skin when a clawed hand darts out and grabs his wrist. Brett sits bolt upright on the couch, snapping awake, and his grip on Mason’s wrist tightens painfully. 

“Brett, come, you’re okay. Let me go.” Mason’s voice is calmer now, but he’s starting to panic more because Brett’s claws are digging into his skin and he swears he can hear bone cracking. “Brett, you’re okay, just breathe, man, you’re okay.”

Brett’s not listening though, glowing golden eyes fixed on some point just to the right of Mason’s head, his breathing ragged and strained. 

“Brett, you need to breathe. Brett!” Mason calls, trying to wiggle his arm free. 

Brett’s grip just tightens and his eyes widen in panic as they move to look at Mason. 

“Can’t… I can’t…” Brett stutters out, “Can’t breathe.” 

The hand that’s not holding Mason’s wrist in a death grip reaches for his own chest and Mason sees the claws on that hand too late. 

“Brett don’t!” He shouts, but Brett’s already dug his own claws into his chest, running jagged lines across his body, shredding his shirt. 

His grip on Mason tightens and Mason’s panic spikes. 

“Brett, Brett, hey, Brett!” He calls the werewolf’s name over and over again until he catches his attention. Brett snaps his gaze to Mason, eyes wide with fear and his hand stop halfway through clawing down his chest again. “Brett, stop. You’re hurting yourself. Look at me. I need you to breathe, okay? Breathe for me, please,” Mason all but begs, his face scrunching up in pain.

“I… can’t.” Brett gasps out the words between gasps for air. “I… I can’t…. breathe. I… can’t breathe.” Each word sounds more panicked and Mason’s heart twists in his chest. 

He shakes his head. “Yes, yes you can. I think you’re having a panic attack Brett. I promise, you can breathe. Come on, you can… hey, okay, how about this.” Mason reaches out and gently takes Brett’s free hand in his, pulling the claws away from his chest, not worried about the blood at the moment. He lays Brett’s hand over his own chest, right over his heart and takes a deep breath. “Listen to me. You can do that right? Listen to my heart, and my breathing? I want to you do that. Just breathe with me, okay. You can do that. Listen to my heart and breathe.”

It takes a long time for Brett to calm down. 

When he finally does, his entire body is shaking and Mason is pretty sure he can see tears welling in his eyes but he doesn’t say anything about that.

“You think you’re okay now?” Brett shrugs, and moves to wipe away tears, leaving smudges of his own blood across his cheeks. “Okay, now, you wanna let me go please?”

Brett jerks his hand back, almost like he hadn’t realized he was still holding Mason’s wrist. “Fuck, I’m sorry, I just… wolves, we’re really tactile and we take comfort in contact and I was trying to ground myself and I just…. I’m sorry.” Brett chokes out the last two words through a sob and Mason’s heart breaks. He moves to sit next Brett on the couch and wraps his arm around the werewolf’s shoulders, squeezing reassuringly.

Brett turns and presses his face into Mason’s shoulder, his body still trembling and Mason can feel tears soaking the fabric of his shirt. He lets Brett stay that way, rubbing his arm gently until he pulls back on his own, scrubbing at his face with the back of his hand.

“I can still remember it. God I remember all of it. The hunters surrounded the house with mountain ash so we couldn’t get out. One of… I think it was a cop, he got there first, before the fire trucks did, he broke the circle when he got there and pulled me and Laurie off the porch.” Brett’s voice is quiet and Mason feels like he shouldn’t be listening, like he shouldn’t be allowed to hear what Brett’s telling him. “I could smell it. I remember what it was like to smell my family burning.” Brett’s voice shakes and breaks over those words and Mason has to run a hand over his cheeks, Brett’s breaking his heart so much.

Mason pulls Brett into a hug and holds him tightly when he sees that Brett’s crying again. “I’m sorry. You shouldn’t have to… I’m bothering you.” Brett mumbles into Mason’s shoulder.

Mason shakes his head and rubs a hand over Brett’s back. “No, no you’re not.”

Brett mumbles another apology anyway.

“Come on upstairs with me. I don’t wanna leave you alone.” Brett nods and lets Mason lead him to his room. Mason keeps rubbing soothing circles into Brett’s back until they both fall asleep.

It’s the best Brett’s slept in a long time.


End file.
